Isaiah 54:7-8 “‘For a brief moment I abandoned you, but with deep compassion I will bring you back. In a surge of anger I hid my face from you for a moment, but with everlasting kindness I will have compassion on you,’ says the Lord your Redeemer.” This episode talks about how quickly God forgives us and that He will bring us back. There isn't anything we can do to redeem ourselves. God does that with His deep compassion. Music:"Adding the Sun" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
God Will Bring You Back
Isaiah 54:7-8 “‘For a brief moment I abandoned you, but with deep compassion I will bring you back. In a surge of anger I hid my face from you for a moment, but with everlasting kindness I will have compassion on you,’ says the Lord your Redeemer.”
When I heard this verse at prayer group today I knew it was my verse for the day. This verse came right after someone read something she had found in the The Word Among Us. This is what she read, “This all powerful, unchanging God wants to be the source of your peace. He wants to calm your heart when, like Israel, you face uncertainties and suffering. When your sins feel too great for him to forgive, he wants to remind you of his omnipotent and immutable love. When you are tempted to embrace the weak changeable love of this fallen world He longs to gather you to Himself in great tenderness. This is the God whose love will never leave you.
I thought this was so beautiful because we can all get caught up in thinking that whatever we have done in the past is too big for God to ever forgive. We are quick to tell others of God’s love and His forgiveness, and then when it comes to ourselves we assume that we can’t be forgiven because of all that we have done in our past. It is so strange how we can do this and how we don’t see any anything wrong with our thinking. We don’t at all see that we are contradicting ourselves if we tell others that God will forgive all your sins, not matter what they are, and then we don’t believe that about our sins.
I like how this verse shows the realness of God. It show us in the verse that God does get angry. It’s not that He loves everything that we do. It sounds like from this verse that God does get mad at us for some things we do. However, It says, “For a brief moment I have abandoned you, but with deep compassion I will bring you back.” For a brief moment, not for hours, days, weeks or months, but for a brief moment and then He will bring us back. Have you ever felt this way before? Have you ever been so upset with someone that you wanted to abandon them, or at least thought about it? I know I have. I am willing to bet that anyone that has been in any sort of relationship, whether it’s with family, kids, friends, a partner, or whoever has felt this way. Feeling this way doesn’t make us a bad people, it makes us human. Being in relationship with someone is hard. There are so many different personalities, temperaments, likes and dislikes. Then when you add emotions to all of that things can get crazy.
I don’t know about you but when I get angry at someone it usually lasts more than a brief moment. I have done a lot of work to master my thoughts so that I can have more control over my feelings and yet, I still stay angry for longer than a brief moment. Sometimes even when they come back and apologize, we might not be ready to forgive or let go of our anger quite yet. However, God said he abandoned us for a brief moment. Then the next part of that line is even more amazing. God says that with deep compassion he will bring us back. He doesn’t say that with a whole lot of work on our part we can figure out a way to redeem ourselves. He says that with a compassion He will bring us back.
I think this is another thing that we get wrong a lot. We think because we have sinned we need to make it up to God in some way. We think we need to earn his forgiveness. We don’t. God will bring us back, all we need to do is repent of our sins, be truly sorry for having offended Him, and He will bring us back. Can you imagine that level of compassion? Can you imagine how much God must love us to turn away only for a brief moment?
The next line in this verse says, “In a surge of anger I hid my face from you for a moment, but with everlasting kindness I will have compassion on you,’ says the Lord your Redeemer.” This line is similar to the last one. It seems to paint a more vivid picture for us though. “In a surge of anger,” who hasn’t felt that before? I think every one of us can imagine what that feels like, or can remember when we experienced that feeling. When I felt a surge of anger I did not just turn my head away for a moment. I would like to think I walked away to cool down, but I am sure there were plenty of times when I didn’t. When I felt a surge of anger and yelled at the person, or said unkind words. And yet, the Lord, just hid his face from us for a moment. Then it says that with his everlasting kindness he will have compassion on us. Think of the worst thing you have done. Think of the thing that you keep telling yourself that God can’t possibly forgive. Then reread this verse. “‘For a brief moment I abandoned you, but with deep compassion I will bring you back. In a surge of anger I hid my face from you for a moment, but with everlasting kindness I will have compassion on you,’ says the Lord your Redeemer.”
Even the last five words of this verse are so powerful, “says the Lord your Redeemer.” If the two lines at the beginning of the verse weren’t enough to convince you that the Lord will bring you back and that He will have compassion on you, maybe this ending will. This is the Lord your God telling you that He is your redeemer. He is calling Himself your redeemer. Are you going to tell God that He is wrong? Are you going to challenge what He is saying in this verse? God Himself is telling you that He will bring you back and have compassion on you. Why is it that we can’t believe this?
That quote from the Word Among Us that I read early had these two lines in it that I want to leave you with “When you are tempted to embrace the weak changeable love of this fallen world He longs to gather you to Himself in great tenderness. This is the God whose love will never leave you.” God approaches us and interacts with us with a great tenderness. Sometimes we can view him as someone who judges us from afar and waiting to punish us with His wrath. That is not God. God’s love will never leave you. We saw this when he said even in a burst of anger He will hide his face but for a moment. When our sins feel too overwhelming turn to Isaiah 54:7-8. You don’t have to rely on the words of those in this world to calm your mind and your heart. Let God’s words speak directly to your heart. “‘For a brief moment I abandoned you, but with deep compassion I will bring you back. In a surge of anger I hid my face from you for a moment, but with everlasting kindness I will have compassion on you,’ says the Lord your Redeemer.”
Dear Heavenly Father, I ask that you bless all those listening to this episode today. We ask that you forgive us Lord for any way that we may have offended you. We thank you for your deep compassion and everlasting kindness. We don’t deserver your love, kindness and compassion Lord and yet you still give it to us freely. Help us to remember your words to us in this verse Lord God. Help us to understand that you will bring us back. We don’t have to do anything for you, we can’t redeem ourselves, you redeem us through your deep compassion. Lord, we are so very grateful for all that you do. We love you so much and we ask all of this in accordance with your will and in Jesus’ holy name, Amen.
Thank you so much for joining me on this journey to walk boldy with Jesus. Can you believe we are at the end of our 9th week in our “Be more like Jesus Challenge?” I for one can’t believe how fast this time went by. It always amazes me how fast the month of November and December go by. It’s like we are going through them at light speed. Next week will be our last week and that character trait is patience. This is one they say never to pray for because the next thing you know you will be stuck in traffic or some other instance where you get to practice patience. With us being so close to Christmas and all the stores and restaurants being short staffed, I am guessing we will all get plenty of practice with this one this week. I hope you did well trying to be more of a servant this week. I am sure that Jesus appreciate all the effort you put into this challenge over the last 9 weeks. Whether it was reading all the articles and trying all the suggestions, or just listening to the podcasts, or just trying to love people more. I believe that Jesus loves our efforts, not matter how big or how small. I look forward to spending time with you on Monday. Have a blessed weekend!